Commuter Rail and the Creative Class

Baltimore's self confidence is still so shaky that several Baltimore based organizers of the RailVolution conference which was held in DC this year doubted that one of the "Mobile Workshops" should showcase Baltimore. Well, the doubts were overcome and the tour for Baltimore named "Commuter Rail and the Creative Class" was reportedly the one that sold out first.
45 people signed up, hailing from Honolulu, Seattle, Denver, Los Angeles, Portland, Salt Lake City and many other places. They came on a MARC commuter train to Baltimore's Penn Station and were welcomed by a group of Baltimore guides, including me who guided them first on foot and later by Charme City Circulator bus.

The tour was geographically limited to the area around Penn Station also known as the Station North Arts and Entertainment District. The guests walked south on Charles Street, saw on their way the new University of Baltimore (UB) law school under construction (architect Stephan Behnisch, Stuttgart), the new University of Baltimore student housing also under construction and finally entered Baltimore's first Transit Oriented Development (TOD) project: Symphony Center, a project resulting from the construction of Baltimore's initial light rail line.Tony Rogers explained the concept of urban housing and offices with suburban amenities and how the large parking garage is built right over top of the historic Howard Street freight tunnel in which famously a hazardous material tanker car caught fire a few years ago and brought all of downtown to a standstill. It was noted that the large garage is not easily to fill and that structured parking represents a large "stranded cost". Next the group walked over to the new "Fitzgerald" apartments developed and managed by the Bozzutto group. Toby Bozzutto explained how he as an English major picked the name in honor of the writer who lived in adjacent Bolton Hill. The Fitzgerald shows how far Baltimore has come in the last decade. Here no longer the attempt of bringing the suburb to the city, rather an attempt to bring New York style to Baltimore. The market rate apartments fetch top rents and boast a very stylish amenity and community area on the entry level. The project just garnered the top design award of the local AIA. Since the project was constructed on UB's former main parking lot, it too, features a huge parking garage that is partly empty. The garage well hidden from Mt Royal Avenue is quite visible from the Johns Falls Expressway and Penn Station.

 Mobile Workshop participants duly noted that, remarkably, two developers in a row had stated that they had built too much parking. That in itself illustrates the cultural shift that is currently occurring from cul de sac to walkable and transit connective with bike racks and Zip Cars in front of dense living on top of Barnes and Noble and a pizza joint.

The latest model Charme City circulator bus (the hybrid Orion) took the group to a trip down memory lane at the Baltimore Streetcar Museum with its open air tram rides. Stops and tours of the Charles Theatre, ArchPlan's Printers Square Apartments (market rate and affordable housing in rehabilitated former industrial building and a historic firehouse showcased by developer Bill Hazlehurst) and the spanking new Artist Housing on Greenmount Avenue, City Arts, developed by Jubilee Baltimore, concluded the tour. At City Arts a art student from the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) explained what artists want in housing and how students from near and far were attracted to this cool facility, no matter that it is located smack in the middle of a heavily disinvested area. Video clip of City Arts.

The tour showed that Baltimore is grasping the concept of the creative class as well as the idea of transit oriented development and building from strength to such a degree that this tour could even impress people from those cities like  Portland, Seattle and LA that attract young people in droves. All projects are rental apartments and all were fully occupied, the Printers Square, Fitzgerald and City Arts filled in record time. (Tour guide and City Arts developer Charlie Duff addressing the workshop participants: "When you people from Portland come to see Baltimore, I imagine it is like going to the zoo". lots of laughter). Well not anymore. People come to see Baltimore thriving, however not everybody here has gotten the message yet.

Printers Square Apartment  explained

After the open ride at the Streetcar Museum

The Fitzgerald: Transit Oriented Development in Baltimore
From the Mobile Workshop program